How to stimulate outdoor exercise: BAMBEA

Maintaining an active lifestyle is good for our health, but not everybody can find the motivation to exercise. Within the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences project BAMBEA (Bewegen in Amsterdam met Beacons) we research how sensor technology can be used to stimulate outdoor exercise. With our partners the University of Applied Sciences inHolland, the municipality of Amsterdam, Glimworm and Info.nl we transform the Oosterpark to a Living Lab to test concepts. Using Glimworm beacons with a specially developed smartphone app we test the effect of our intervention technique. The app uses the beacons to measure outdoor exercise performance and to give motivational messages.

A Bluetooth beacon is a device that transmits a unique Bluetooth signal once every second. This signal can be used by smartphones and other Bluetooth devices to for example trigger messages or as an indoor substitution for GPS. The triggering messages will stimulate outdoor exercise. Because Bluetooth beacons only transmit signals, there are no direct privacy issues. As with GPS all privacy issues are related to the implementation of the handling of the signal.
Apple implemented its own subversion of Bluetooth beacons called iBeacons. iBeacons are compatible with Bluetooth beacons and differ mostly in the enforcement of more limitations.
For the looks and specifics about a default beacon, you can look at Glimworm beacons.

For the BAMBEA project, Glimworm made a special beacon. This new beacon charges via a solar cell, can be connected to the internet via LoRaWAN, supports communication and supports external sensors.